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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25172668">Another Eternity</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMaw/pseuds/TheMaw'>TheMaw</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Bloodborne (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Mild Gore, Multi, Pre-Established Relationship, Sibling Rivalry, Vignette, Vignette Collection, slightly canon compliant</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 04:20:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,804</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25172668</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMaw/pseuds/TheMaw</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>ghosts gather here, make promises of resurrection and return - bell hooks | a repost and continuation</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Bloody Crow Of Cainhurst/The Hunter, Iosefka (Bloodborne)/Original Character(s), Iosefka/The Hunter (Bloodborne)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. The Girl I Haven't Met</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It always starts the same. But for you, the girl I haven't met, I want things to be different.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He held her face as though she was made of sunlight. As though she was everything holy and pure in this rotting city. This accursed world. She was a small glimmering light, a beacon of hope for the hopeless. A safe haven for those who dared not to dream. And yet he found himself at a loss when he saw the shame which fell across her face. The way she looked away from him and couldn't muster up speech. All of his desperate pleading had done little to sway her heart. All of his desperation had done little more than keep her rooted to the spot.</p><p>To this last sanctuary in all of this madness.</p><p>“I can’t leave my patients.” She said, her hands carefully moving to rest upon his own. Her warm, gloved hands, curled tight upon his own. His hands which had framed her face, thumbs stroking the swell of her reddened cheeks. “They need me.”</p><p>“And I need you!” He snapped, white teeth coming together with a violent click before he could stop himself. And how desperately he wanted to stop himself. But he knew, and oh how he knew, he couldn't stop. That this had to be. This dance, the same dance he’d surely danced a thousand times.  </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Window</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Twin hunters discuss the merits of an ugly/beautiful weapon in front of a dear friend.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><div class="chapter">
  <p></p>
  <div class="userstuff module">
    <p>“It’s an ugly weapon,” he chuckled, leaning his weight against the Boom Hammer. The unique construct of metal, weighty from it’s obscenely large head and miniature furnace, rested upon his slender shoulder and the crook of his arm. From the window, the sound of Gilbert’s ragged coughing echoed, a bout of laughter managing to weave it’s way between desperate gasps and occasional hacks. “You see, he agrees with me.”</p>
    <p>“Gilbert does not.” She snapped at her twin, but not nearly as harshly as she wanted to sound. No, she hardly had the heart to muster any new anger. Not during this tiring, long night. This Nightmare in the making. She glanced his way as she lifted the beautiful, almost ornate sword. A bow - really - in the shape of a sword. She can almost make out the careful mechanisms which will cause the blade to split in two, and the string to unravel. It’s a work of art, she wants to say, but can’t even muster. To say that would be like admitting a fault, and she wouldn’t do that even if her life depended on it.</p>
    <p>“It’s…” Silence falls between the hunters as their friend at last speaks, his voice audibly breathless. His pause is long lived, and she almost starts to strain her ears to hear if he’s still breathing. She almost wants to reach through the bars of his window and try to force the damned thick glass to open. “It’s not an ugly weapon. It’s unusual.”</p>
    <p>“That’s not fair,” her brother huffs.</p>
    <p>“Don’t be like that.” Gilbert managed to say, before his voice was stolen away by another fit. It was painful to hear, and more than that, it was painful to bear witness to. She has to tear her mind away from Gilbert. Away from the inevitable. She shifts the bowblade in her grasp, turning it this way and that.</p>
    <p>It’s better this way.</p>
  </div>
</div><div class="chapter">
  <p></p>
  <div class="chapter preface group">
    <p> </p>
  </div>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Sanctimonious Blood</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The Hunt progresses and the Moon grows closer. Too close for those on the cusp of madness to bear.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><div class="chapter">
  <p></p>
  <div class="userstuff module">
    <p>His heart very well threatens to hammer its way out of his chest and onto the intricate mural of the Cathedral's floor in its excitement. He's far too late to enact his vengeance upon the clerics, it seems. Most have gone on to become beasts - hideous things of matted fur and stinking blood, one or two strong and defiled enough to ascend to something worse. It is always those of the strongest faith who become the very worst of beasts. He supposes he's made up for it in this - watching the ragged, bleeding figure of Yharnam's last Crow drag herself across the dusty floor towards the towering doors. Even now, split open as she is, she clings to her blades. More than once she has swiped at him feebly when he's drawn near.</p>
    <p> </p>
    <p></p>
    <div>
      <p>Curses in her thick accent grind out from behind her mask. Eileen is straining, pulling on the fumes of her last blood vial to make it to the exit.</p>
      <p>He does not care if she lives long enough to actually see out the Cathedral's doors. There's enough to see within the vestibule - bloody and beautiful moonlight spilling in through the eerily foggy glass and turning the stone it touches vibrant with color. Hints of moonlight blue, of winter white. The light looks nearly liquid, as though he might be able to scoop up some of it in his palm to study if he but tried. Would it have weight to it? Would it be cold as the evening air just beyond those too large windows? The thoughts linger, twisting in his mind as though desperate to keep hold of him. Far more desperate than that woman had been.</p>
      <p>She would return. She would never so easily give up on her mark.</p>
      <p>Unbidden, his feet carry him towards the altar. Blood Saints of the Healing Church would have carried out their duty here, he assumes. Whatever that entailed - he'd never studied the customs of Yharnam very closely in that regard. The low table of fine marble reaches his waist, but only barely. There's a cloth, perhaps once richly embroidered, covering the rock and adding a dusty sort of gravitas to the whole thing. Perhaps there would have been other things laying here, waiting for use, when the Church was still hale and powerful. A goblet perhaps, and a knife - for he cannot imagine the self-consumed Saints willing to lower themselves enough to use anything else.</p>
      <p>No doubt they would have those whom begged for their aid grovel as they approached, with thin sickly hands trembling as their supposed salvation was eased from living flesh.</p>
      <p>No other way to do it really, he supposed.</p>
      <p>Some buried instinct, some habit from his days as a guard of the Queen makes him kneel once he's stepped up to the dais. The coat of feathers spreads out around him, marring the stone with inky black and dark blood, very little of it his own. He bows his head as though Her Majesty where here instead of an inert slab of worship, resting his dominant hand over his heart.</p>
      <p><em>"For Cainhurst."</em> He rasps, distantly surprised that he can speak at all. Surprised that it doesn't stick to his tongue, the walls of his throat. It vibrates in his ears, swims in his thoughts, his very heart. For Cainhurst. For the Queen and all her many courtiers, their lives snuffed out all too soon by the twisted sycophants of the Church. Disgusting fools, obsessed over their idea of martyrdom. As if they had any right to pin this damned curse upon the lives of Cainhurst.</p>
      <p>The cathedral doors bang open and he is standing before the sound is done echoing around the ceiling, Chikage in hand and the blood singing in his ears, his veins.</p>
      <p>It is not Eileen he sees, but his world narrows down to a thin point all the same - <em>she</em> is the only thing that fills the scope of his vision.</p>
      <p>A sight he must look, some far-off part of him, still possibly sane, muses. The once hallowed space around them is quiet enough that he can hear the hitch in her breath, his senses extended to their fullest allow him to practically <em>taste</em> her surprise, the very first tinge of fear.</p>
      <p>Her hand tightens around her cane, slender graceful steel glinting wickedly in the bestial moonlight. It's a beautiful weapon, befitting of her. He can see it now, the length of her auburn hair, the vividness of her emerald eyes. The soft pallor of her exposed skin. The attire she wears makes his heart thunder in his chest. He recognizes the Black Church Hunter's top, the billowing sleeves, the white scarf. He recognizes the armored leggings of Cainhurst's knights, how they mold to her legs. She is such a sight.</p>
      <p>The first blow is his, before the dust can even settle from his lunge - his surprise bright and sweet as he imagines her blood must be when she manages not to be gutted instantly. She does not fold under his assault, not like the old Crow did. Priscilla weathers the strikes from the Chikage with only a faint trembling in her knees, a desperate shove meant to unbalance him and drive a little more space between their bodies.</p>
      <p>He misses the heat of her immediately and the tempting, sweet scent of lunar flowers.</p>
      <p>Does she dream?, he wonders.</p>
      <p>The thought does nothing to stay his hand when, rather than feed his sword more of his blood, he raises his Repeating Pistol and puts a shot directly into her shoulder.</p>
      <p>She cries out but does not drop her weapon.</p>
      <p>Gehrman trained her well.</p>
      <p>She darts back, a vial glinting between her fingers right before she drives it into her thigh. A brief mist surrounds her as the Ministration does its work - tainting the air with the smell and taste of Cleric blood.</p>
      <p>It gnaws at him, that smell. Drives the notch of his temper just the slightest bit higher.</p>
      <p>He dashes forward and swings at her again, hardly feeling the vibrations in his throat as he makes some guttural noise. If it frightens her she doesn't show it and he cannot smell it - not when flowers and incense and blood cloud his senses every time he gets close enough to strike out with the Chikage again.</p>
      <p>Once, the poison of the blade had hurt him. Now it is such a familiar and nostalgic thing that he welcomes it as his vision wavers, caught between a half-lucid fantasy of the slaughter of his home and the woman he's fighting now. It blurs, somewhere in his mind, red tinging his vision and he hardly realizes that he's won until he feels the shudder wrack through her body.</p>
      <p>By the blood, she's so small in his arms. Blood speckles her lips, color drains from her face as the Chikage takes it in, her skin soft and pliant where his other hand touches her back.</p>
      <p>She's got muscle now. There's strength in the thin limbs attempting to push him away and he relishes the thought, the certainty, that she will come back again.</p>
      <p><em>"You should have stayed in your library."</em> He murmurs by the shell of her ear, no longer entirely sure whether he means it as a cruel jest or out of some desire<em> not</em> to kill her again.</p>
      <p>There is no response, save for the shudder that passes through her frame and the dissolution of her body into moonlit mist. It leaves him in silence, reeling, drunk on adrenaline and blood and flowers.</p>
      <p>He cannot wait for when she tries to kill him again.</p>
    </div>
  </div>
</div><div class="chapter">
  <p></p>
  <div class="chapter preface group">
    <p> </p>
  </div>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. We Think Too Much</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>There are secrets in the Hunter's Refuge, in the workshop.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The last drops of the deep red blood snake through the dips and curves of the saif, seeping so deep into the dark metal that it leaves only a damp sheen. She rises on the tips of her toes to reach for a hook, to pull down the chain. The pulley groans only slightly, metal singing as it moves at her behest so she might hang the damp blade. So it might cast shadows upon the ornate, unused scythe. That scythe with no owner. That scythe whose body was like a twisted, old branch, wrapped with such care in discolored bandages. It was there when she awoke, so long ago now, and it was there each time she returned, without a speck of dust upon it, unlike some of the blades and bottles and baubles. The warm candlelight danced upon it’s curved blade, illuminating the runes which had been carved into that unique metal.</p><p>She didn’t linger on it for too long, her hands already moving to loose her cane from its resting place against her leg and the table. Fingers fit comfortably around the grip, sliding down to the small, easily missed button. It depressed under the weight of her finger, and the blade shifted, unlocking. It clicked in place, as it always did, and should she swing, wild and childishly, it would snap out, binding extending so sharpened blades might cut through the air and tear into all that stood. She wasn’t on the battlefield, of course, and so she needn’t take such an action. She simply had to repair what damage had been done, and infuse it with more blood as she had the larger, wilder saif.</p><p>The task was one that had become nearly second nature to the Hunter. It was just an additional step to whatever goal had been set before her. The night outside of this dream would not move on until she wanted it to - or so she had been led to believe. Not by her pseudo-mentor nor the Plain Doll who greeted her with all the warmth of a serving girl, a familiarity she knew all too well having been in a similar position all her years, but it was the way the world seemed to work.</p><p>It had been night for an impossible amount of hours now. Nearly unending. And only once she’d slain certain beasts did the moon seem to shift and change, and the color of the sky with it. A chilling thought that she shouldn’t dwell on for longer than need be.</p><p>Chain groaned only slightly as she hooked her cane upon it, and fed the chain back up. It moved slowly under the care of her hands, lifting the cane up to dangle from the ceiling with the other weapons she’d collected, some untouched in the recent hours, and others nearly forgotten due to her lack of experience or inability to use them. Her gaze moved over them, catching sight of the way the light played across their surfaces, revealing hidden details that would have gone unnoticed in the corrupting streets or by those who lacked interest in them.</p><p>But once more the red haired hunter found her gaze drawn to the scythe. Such a queer weapon, what purpose did it have? Surely it would have been too risky to use against the beasts, though it gave its wielder considerable space between them and the beast. And surely it’s terrifying blade could be used on its own like a makeshift sword. But it didn’t look as though it could really stand to the test of time. No, if a beast came from behind, or perhaps the sides while one was occupied…</p><p>She reached, tentatively, leaning her body against the workbench. The sweet blood perfumed the air, invading her nose, her mouth with each breath she took. The cloth bunched beneath her hand, threatening to rest against her newly acquired garb. The table was sturdy, and though the many glass jars and tools rattled as they were moved, she didn’t fear over much for them falling from their place and spilling across the floor. She wanted to put her hand upon the old weapon, prove to herself it was not merely a decoration. Perhaps it had been left there for her, an offering from the childlike Messengers who greeted her at lamp posts or waved from baths and tombstones.</p><p>“Dear girl is something a miss?” Gehrman’s voice broke through the fog of her thoughts. Curiosity rooted itself in the elderly Hunter’s voice, and it caused a blush of shame to rise to her cheeks. When had he gotten there? Wheeled his way up the path without her even noticing? Was she so wrapped up in the spell of the scythe that she had missed the squeak of his wheelchair, or the perception of another entering the small confines of the workshop. She drew back slowly from the weapon, armor encased shoes coming into contact with the hardwood floor.</p><p>“I’m sorry Master Gehrman,” she said softly, her gaze downcast. “It was just… this weapon here, is it not a weapon meant for The Hunt?”</p><p>The air of the workshop stills, and for a moment Priscilla felt even more ashamed of herself than she already was. But she couldn't quite pinpoint why. It escaped her each time she reached for it, turning the question over and over in her mind. She said something which had made the other uncomfortable, be it the title she’d tacked onto his name or the more important question. That scythe. Whatever burning curiosity had wrapped itself around her mind had fled into the silence.</p><p>“Oh, that old thing,” he spoke at last, a hum attaching itself to his words. His hands curled over his cane, and they seemed to tremble. The tremors of overworked nerves or age. Tremors different from those brought on by adrenaline or fear, or even pain. She doesn’t allow herself to dwell on it, even as she tilted her head ever so slightly to the side. Loose auburn locks fell across her features and made her hands itch to tuck the strands back. But she doesn’t want to move until Gehrman does. Until he speaks and finishes his thought. “It is but a decoration,” he lifted his head so he might meet her gaze. He looked so sad, pain streaking across his features. The pain of loss, she was certain. “Nothing for you to concern yourself with, lass.”</p><p>“I’m sorry.” She is quick to keep silence from falling between them once more. Her heart couldn’t take it. “I didn’t mean to trouble you, Master Gehrman.”</p><p>“Hush now child. You should gather your wits about you, return to The Hunt.” Gehrman breathed deep, and let his head lower once more. “The night is long, and you’ve only just begun.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. The Mirror Pool</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>If she listened hard enough, and remained still enough, Violet could hear the distant sound of someone singing from the lake. A voice as lonely as her own, or, perhaps lonelier still. A mournful wail that pricked at her senses, made her eyes sting and her sinuses ache as though she had just plunged head first into the mirrorlike waters. It was a sound which had only begun to accompany the midnight bell recently, when all students should have been safely tucked in their beds, whilst the maidservants of the college went about with their never ending tasks, and the Groundskeeper put away his tools for the night. And yet she remained, wide awake and listening, listening until the song dissipated. It curled around her, cradling her in it’s sorrows.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The weeping, wailing, singing of the lake.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She couldn’t tell where the sound originated from, not at first, for the whole of Byrgenwerth was as vast as any college, filled to the brim with those few students who were both eligible and able to attend. Full of those who came from the great Church in the midst of Yharnam proper. She couldn’t tell when she had truly started to hear it, the song of the lake. If it was during one of the long nights spent studying in the library or perhaps the Lunarium when she couldn’t sleep and had snuck out of the dorms. Or if it was after one of her late evening classes, her head full of too many words and the day not having near enough hours for her difficult classes. It crept in at some point, under the doors or through a crack in the windowpane. It sunk into her weary head, and lingered well into her distant dreams. It inspired such curious images. A Blood Moon, swollen and red, pressing in, as big as the Sun, and bigger still then she could bear. A woman in a bloodied gown - a wedding gown perhaps? And a figure she couldn't see, couldn't distinguish, but knew was there.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A dream that stuck with her till the end. A dream which reoccurred enough she swore it tried to appear in her waking world.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A dream she carried like a secret, swearing to take it to her grave. But that song, it haunted her more than any dream. It prayed upon some gentle thing in her. Pulled at her heartstrings, as well as her mind. That eerie song like a whaling ghost, and though she didn't believe in ghosts, this had nearly tempted her. But she was a woman of science, for what it was worth, and this ought to have no place in her mind. It would pass, she had sworn to herself, and once more sought to bury herself into her studies. At first the song had flickered into her mind sporadically, like a tune which one might recall all of the sudden when no pressing matters might hold their attention. And the dream had grown distant and foggy by then. But that was weeks ago now, prior to this still evening. She had often wondered if others had heard it, though never once had she brought it up. It was hard to breach such a topic when she was already held at a distance for being as dark as she was.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The temptation to tell those she held close was so terribly great, to ask Anya or Odelia if they had heard it to. She would have, she supposed, if she hadn't begun to feel nauseous at the mere thought. If she hadn't begun to grow strangely ill the more she listened to that mysterious music. Day in and day out, through class periods and study hours, that haunting song had gnawed its way into her waking hours. Had become something of an obsession. And now she found herself this evening holding so terribly still. Straining her ears just to hear it. To find it. Sleep could wait a moment longer, so long as she could pick out those notes. So long as she could feel that watery pull.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If she listened hard enough, and if she remained still enough, Violet was sure she could hear it. Was sure that she could feel it sinking into her very marrow. Those distant cries. That loneliness. All the familiarity of that mournful wail. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It seemed to grow steadily louder, and Violet found the world swirling and changing about her. She had begun to bleed into the world, or perhaps the world was bleeding into her, pulling her into the dripping colors. Pulling her soul out through her mouth, and forcing it back in all at once. Nerve endings screamed so soul shatteringly loud. Her lungs felt as though they might burst. Her very senses had become like a plague. </span>
  <span>Pain lanced it’s way up her spine, tearing along her shoulders. Blood, thick and syrupy soaked through the back of her garments where bones tore through skin, body contorting and rearranging itself to fit some new arrangement. Some new unknowable appearance. She wanted to scream, choking back hot tears which made her vision swim. The song, that haunting, wailing song, filled her head, her being. Those woeful cries clogged up her senses, pulling her under even as newly formed limbs continued to burst out of her back. Even as her head felt like it might burst. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was - who was she? What was she?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In the ashen glow of the moon’s eerie light, the beast stirred, small wings, damp with blood, uncurled. Muted yellow eyes shone wetly, unfocused gaze casting all about. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A living Garden of Eyes newly born.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Another Sin to the Growing Pyre</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>His body jolted, seizing, thrashing, kicking up dust and rocks, hands reaching out and clawing stone in an attempt to get away. The flesh on the sides of his face began to tear more and more with each desperate cry, each shriek of pain. His constant annoying begging. Reddened lips, bruised and torn, curled in the doll-like face of his attacker. No matter how he pleaded, how he begged and cried, the winding, mist drenched alleyway offered no savior. No solace from the torture that had descended upon him the moment that monster in the shape of a woman had found him.</p>
<p>He was a man trapped. A man turned to prey, turned to sport for a hunter most vile. For a girl made of stone, pretty as a saint, and vile as the Devil.<br/>The deadly edge of the woman’s curved sword slipped into the fool's mouth, bloody edge scrapping against his teeth. With a curious tilt of her head she turned the bow’s blade. Steel clicked as it dragged along each tooth in its way. The terribly sharp edge of the blade scrapped along his tongue, coating it in the blood of thousands, removing the thin skin off the top of the muscle.</p>
<p>“Stop crying.”</p>
<p>Her command was met with frightened eyes, with such vile hatred. A thousand emotions colored the deep, murky darkness of his eyes. Tears began to well up once more, reminding her of an over-sized seal. He wouldn't do it. He was desperately trying to cling to his life, to some semblance of humanity. Surely he was trying to plead with the long dead girl she used to be. ( Emotional. Young and full of life, ready to please any who would smile her way. ) The girl who would become anything for the sake of her brother, to protect him from the Church, the Bloodsaints, the needles and experiments. A life to despise.</p>
<p>Pity seek what once was gone. Dead and pushed into a watery grave.</p>
<p>She watched him as a serpent did, hidden gaze cold and calculating. Her heart did not sway for his tears, nor his fears. The pain and pleading and begging, and by the Blood was he pleading. Her nose did wrinkle, and instinct did guide her.</p>
<p>She’d had enough of this game of cat and mouse.  </p>
<p>She bore down on the sword inside his saliva and blood filled mouth, pushing the hellish blade between his teeth. She sawed through his teeth and gums, pushing the blade as far down as she dared without completely sawing through bone. Blood bubbled forth, running down his front like a river. His screams were mangled around the sword. Piss accompanied the blood pooling around his large figure.  He’d gone and soiled himself like an animal, fear too great to ignore. Fear overriding his senses, for surely he wished to preserve himself no matter the cost. She was not done yet. No, she still wanted to accomplish one last task. One last unkindness for one done to her. She turned the sword as best she could, watching how his jaw snapped in two. She pushed the halves out outward wider and wider, rending flesh and muscle. His throat began filling with frothy blood, bone and teeth fragments.</p>
<p>A horrific display.</p>
<p>Her bow’s blade was wrenched free from the violated cavern of his mouth, leaving him as broken as any beast upon the slick stones, lit only by the incense burners that managed to pierce the veil of fog.</p>
<p>“Child,” another called to her, a member of the church come to collect their hound. Their porcelain doll splattered in blood, spit, bone and fragments of teeth. “You’re wanted at the church, make not a mess of yourself.” He spoke to her as one might speak to a dog in need of discipline. A tone just sharp enough, just harsh enough to spark shame in the heart. Pity it was that her heart didn’t seem to swell with any emotion. That she felt not shame, but the faint passions of anger, of rage.</p>
<p>She was no girl to be spoken of so.</p>
<p>But she was not free of their leash, could not retaliate in a manner most befitting of a woman scorned. She tipped her head like an obedient pup, turning to face the black garbed hunter, all too familiar with the dress of the Church and it’s cruel wolves. One day she would turn on them, as any dog might, for pulling the leash too taunt, for reaching hand out to her. She would make them suffer more than that man who’d laid hand upon her. Who’d struck her cross the mouth, broke skin and spilled her watery blood.</p>
<p>She’d drag them beneath the tide, not as a hound, but as a serpent might. Drag them deep below the swell of the tides, into the bitter cold depths where no moonlight might reach. Where in their last moments they would look upon her and know fear.</p>
<p>She stepped with care away from the blood and piss threading through the gaps in the stone. Her gloved hand wrapped tight round the hilt of her weapon, keeping it aloof enough that the filthy blood might drip into the muck and mire, leaving a fading trail behind her. Let the Church Hunter deal with the corpse of her victim. Her prey. Call it a beast and incinerate it.</p>
<p>Another sin to add to the growing pyre.</p>
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<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Silent All These Years</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Within a winter wonderland of antiquity, we shall meet again. I, a pale ghost, and you, a distant memory beyond the vale.</p>
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    <p>I awoke from my deep slumber, the winter air sharp, fresh, lingering in my lungs. I knew why I had awoken, long before I need open my eyes. He had returned, that ghost of mine. That phantom from the abyss, a shadow that possessed my heart in my youth. That shadow which had vanished in my yearning for life and freedom and existence beyond the pale. My fingers twitched, coming alive along the scabbard of my blessed sword. I drew breath into my lungs and held it till I could no more discern the scent of sweet winter and blood. Held it until my lungs protested, reminding me that I lived. That I breathed. That I was awake.</p><p>And I wondered, if only for a moment, if Maria felt so in her Nightmare bound eternity. Did she always sit so properly, even slouched like a corpse? And when she stirred in her unlife, did she hold her breath until her lungs begged for release? </p><p>How amusing that I would live as a shadow of her, the grand Lady Maria. Or, perhaps, that was not so. Perhaps I was more like an echo. Some homage to her. No, as truly amusing as that might all be, that was not what my children had in mind. They wanted me living and able. For how long I did not know. An eternity? Separated now from that watery curse, and from Flora’s terrifying might. They wanted me to live, to be able to live out my grief. To be able to live out my guilt-ridden existence, constantly wondering if I was the last of my kin, or if, at the very least my sister Gwenhwyfach still lived. If she had escaped the curse of the blood, if she had been able to have a family and love and all that entailed.</p><p>How I prayed such might be the case. That she was free while I remained in this frigged prison. Unlike I. Unlike our deathless queen. </p><p>And now He. </p><p>He stood tall as I had remembered, perhaps taller still. ( When had I opened my eyes to look at him? )  Moon pale skin, hair long and dark as the midnight sky. He was as beautiful as I remembered, angular jaw and sharp features. I wish I could see his eyes, shadowed as they were by his low brimmed hat. But I knew, I knew them so well. His eyes had always reminded me of moonstones rimmed in darkness. Pray that hadn’t changed, even as he was now, a beast in the flesh of familiarity. He had been such a beautiful knight, even when he obscured his face with the ornate mask of those below his station, dressed in the beauty and antiquity of our King’s Guard. A position I had longed for in youth, for no woman had ever been able to guard our King so far as I had been told.</p><p>Our dead king, silenced before I had been deemed full grown.</p><p>"Medraut?"  I asked, my own voice a quiet whisper, somehow carrying over the winter chill. I yearned for the sound of his voice, so very low, very dark. Reminding me of the loving bass my husband had adored before he left my side. ( My fault. I had poisoned him. ) I stood, at last, my body moving with a mechanical grace, like a delicately crafted puppet on spider web strings. He shifted, and all the spines and spikes and tails moved with him, dark shape spilling across the snow slick roof. I could see it. See Him. The real Him, who had chosen to consume and change and evolve and become greater than Flora. Greater than Ebrietas and Rom and all the rest.</p><p>And who had he done this for? Not for I, nor our Queen.</p><p>For a woman I had known only briefly, hidden behind a door, voice sweet as wildflowers and worrying as a maiden. No lass of our beloved Cainhurst.</p><p>"I haven’t been called such in so long."  He spoke, at last, the words rippling in the air as though they traveled across water. His voice made my soul quiver, made my chest tighten as though my corset had been pulled too taut. Until my ribs felt like they might shatter. His presence was different from my twins. My deep-sea prison guards. He was older than they, than I could perceive. He had traveled through that cycle far longer than any other I had seen, perhaps to the surprise of Gehrman. How long had he suffered to become this? How many times had he torn through Great One over and over again, every fragment of their existence within the spiraling dungeons and the hellish Dream? The Nightmare? </p><p>And, at long last, I knew fear. I could perceive what could severe the ties binding myself to those children. I could perceive what could kill me if the whim struck it.</p><p>And I could not speak. I remained still, watching him through the crystals which decorated my lashes. He was so terrible, so beautiful. He stepped closer and I could see the burial blade in his possession, as heart stilling as it had been in Gehrman’s gnarled hands.   "And I knew you."</p><p>"Yes, long ago."  I nodded slowly, snow falling loose from my own hat, my hair. He had known me once, long ago, pigtails and corkscrew curls. Elaborate gowns which never stayed pure for long. He knew me, clumsy in dancing shoes, unsteady with a blade. He knew me, as awkward as a duckling, or a newborn fawn. And he had been patient with me. And he had overseen my slow progress into a knight. And he had seen the Queen lay sword upon my shoulders, and my lips upon her wrist. Did he recall it as I did? Did he see it in that murky light of yonder year? My hands remained poised over my sword, ready to draw forth my chikage. Ready to attempt to face off against Medraut. The phantom of my past. </p><p>We were relics now of what once was, and could never be again.</p>
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